Eve Hens

Employees of the Genesee County’s Central Services department, while not in the public spotlight, are worthy of recognition for their efforts to keep municipal buildings clean and control costs related to purchasing, printing and mailing, the county’s purchasing director said earlier this week.

“This year our main focus was on the safety and health component,” said Eve Hens during her department review at the County Legislature’s Ways & Means Committee meeting at the Old County Courthouse.

Hens said a heightened emphasis was placed upon the physical safety of the custodial crew, making sure that all practices complied with Center for Disease Control and Department of Health guidelines. Those included the purchase of nontoxic cleaning supplies throughout all the facilities and three electrostatic cleaners to meet COVID-19 standards.

“(The custodial staff) maintained communication with building occupants throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to coordinate increased cleaning and sanitation practices as required,” Hens reported, noting that custodians maintained and cleaned 36,000 square feet per full-time equivalent (position) for most of 2020 – more than the industry standard of 28,000 square feet per FTE.

Hens said the department met its objectives of reducing expenses and staying within budgets for purchasing, ensuring that officials were properly trained to follow purchasing policy and procedure, operating in a safe and secure manner, and striving to improve efficiency in all areas.

“We continue to provide top level customer service both internally (for county employees) and externally (for the public),” she said, reporting that the cleaning staff received a 90-percent rating via a survey of county employees.

In the area of purchasing, Hens said a “paperless” office was created to save money, specifically transferring paper documents to computer storage, which is safer as well.

Through the use of P-Cards for vendor invoicing, the department will save $77,500 this year, she said, significant in light of reduced transactions due to COVID-19.

Hens said mail room/print shop activities were “a bit of a challenge at 50-percent staffing” (due to furloughs), but her staff continues to perform courier service to all 12 county buildings, plus the Town of Batavia offices, City of Batavia Police Department and Premier Genesee Nursing Home (on behalf of the Department of Social Services).

A contract with IMS Inc., of Liverpool, a data and mail services company, enables the county to receive a reduced postage rate for first-class unsorted mail.

The county is expected to spend about $51,000 in mail costs this year, a decrease of $12,000 from 2019 and less than the “benchmark” figure of $60,000, Hens reported.